


Good as Gold Lost at Sea

by nonky



Category: Nancy Drew (TV 2019)
Genre: F/M, Season/Series 01
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-27
Updated: 2019-11-27
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:54:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21585688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nonky/pseuds/nonky
Summary: She was good, and he wanted her. Nick just didn't think he could afford her anymore. There was $5 million in implicating bearer bonds hidden in his room, and a lot of information on powerful people who wouldn't flinch making an ex-con disappear. He had a few things to lose, and Nancy never allowed a foundation to go without an earthquake of appraisal. He was only just back to standing, and he couldn't keep his footing around her.Spoilers up episode 7.
Relationships: Nancy Drew/Ned Nickerson
Comments: 1
Kudos: 2
Collections: Nancy Drew TV Series (2019)





	Good as Gold Lost at Sea

Nick had assumed the worst of his life was behind him. He'd killed a young man and had to cope with the guilt during his trial. He'd been imprisoned, and released to a world that had quietly recycled all the potential of his opportunities to other people who hadn't been caught out in their mistakes. 

He couldn't go home and have people looking at him like a killer. He picked a town, found a job, and started fresh. It was only after he'd met Nancy he realized he'd been hoping for someone new in his life. Horseshoe Bay was small enough there weren't a lot of people in their twenties. He had a few friends, but a girlfriend was a warm, comforting presence. 

If her few years biologically younger felt a little long compared to his time in jail, he reminded himself he wasn't old. Some days he felt that way, and he should give Nancy credit for being smart. She hadn't seen some of the things he had, and that lingering innocence was an assurance people had cared for her. He couldn't judge her for being lucky in ways he hadn't been. Her mother's death had created a maturity and a need to move on from her hometown. Nancy had suffered, and was grieving, but she hadn't had to piece together her whole identity after being taken out of society to consider her crime.

Before Tiffany's death, he'd been hopeful Horseshoe Bay would a quiet little place to lose his old self and find a new one. Nick found a favourite restaurant, a second-hand shop with cool t-shirts, and a row picked out in the local movie theater. He knew when the weather report said rain to move the truck inside, unless he wanted to bail out the truck bed. He had some nodding acquaintances, and a few customers who always said hello when they saw him outside the garage. His biggest problem was dating a girl who didn't want to be seen with him in public. Nick couldn't be a source of shame for anyone. He had spent too long building up his self-worth to try again as an adult.

He didn't know what more he could do, for Nancy or for Tiffany. He could offer to listen, provide comfort and help, but they hid everything until it was forced out by negative circumstances. It had cost Tiffany her life, and Nick couldn't help thinking there was a moment he should have been able to step in. He hadn't known she would be in town, and then he was standing over her body.

He was a suspect, his friend was dead, and he had five million dollars he'd never expected. It was too much to discard, and too much to use. He desperately wanted to do right by Tiffany, and wasn't sure how. 

He might have been too pushy with Nancy. He could have let the relationship grow more gradually, until she felt the same willingness to face outsiders as a couple. They had yet to go on a normal date, and he still wanted that, but he didn't know when they had time. The whole day was usually work, and the night was snooping or stealing. 

Their less than legal activities made them jump right to trust a little faster than either of them felt it with certainty. They had shifted and altered, moving in concert as the circumstances changed around them. Somehow, while they lined up emotionally, they had drifted from the same goal. Nancy still wanted justice for Tiffany, but she also need justice for Lucy Sable, and to protect Ryan Hudson, and to understand why her father was wrapped up in secret money transfers from twenty years ago. 

She was good, and he wanted her. Nick just didn't think he could afford her anymore. There was $5 million in implicating bearer bonds hidden in his room, and a lot of information on powerful people who wouldn't flinch making an ex-con disappear. He had a few things to lose, and Nancy never allowed a foundation to go without an earthquake of appraisal. He was only just back to standing, and he couldn't keep his footing around her. 

She didn't seem to recognize her own position was one on the periphery of the town's high society. She wasn't rich, but she lived in a big house with a father who knew how to seek guarantees of her safety. Her quick mind let her handle people, had talked a man out of $1.5 million dollars in a quick chat in a parking lot. Nancy got away with some things, and other things people willfully shrugged off as an unfortunate hobby for a young lady. She had backup, and Carson Drew would not part with his daughter without raising hell. 

Nick could afford a thousand lawyers, but none of them would protect him like one good person believing in him. He'd thought it was her, but Nancy was splitting and splitting the focus of their small group to ineffectual efforts for all their respective mysteries. He should have insisted the gold coins go right to the FBI agent. If justice truly mattered, he shouldn't have delayed it by even a day. 

But that meant he should be saying something about Carson Drew's secret payout from the Hudsons, and he couldn't do that to Nancy's family. He was worried what every file would hold, and knew he was probably missing a thousand details trained law enforcement could find. 

It felt like a moment would come when he had no choice but to betray Nancy and her father. He couldn't handle feeling bad when following Tiffany's last request severed any chances with a girl he could love. 

Nancy was riches he couldn't spend, at a time he couldn't afford the insurance to feel safe possessing her. Nick had to be strong enough to open his hands so they could part friends, and save his own heartbreak.


End file.
